battery equalizing, and does this stuff work? more battery stuff......

[pvcces]

The length of time used for equalizing is going to depend on the charge rate and the battery capacity. IIRC, the Heart inverters I have looked at use 6 amps for 8 hours as a default. This will tend to put a limit on heating and gassing.

There should be more specific information in the inverter manuals.

Tom Caffrey

[DavidInWilmNC]

As to the desulfation, I've got a charger (I honestly can't remember the name or model), but it's got something like  2, 10, 20, 40, and 100 amp jump start settings.  It has a desulfation mode.  I got two group 24 batteries from a friends cheesy Class A rv with one of those constant voltage converter/chargers that kills batteries.  The batteries were so low (about 4.3 volts, if I remember correctly) and wouldn't charge, as they were too dead.  I put my old Shumacher 10 amp charger on them for a few days until they got up to over 12 volts.  I then put the new charger on them (3 stage including desulfation) and let it go overnight.  I then ran the desulfation mode on each of them for about 3-4 days.  I let them sit for about a month and they seemed fine.  I used one in my boat (302 ford V8) with a backup battery just in case and it worked fine.  The other is the start battery for my genset, and it seems fine, too.  I try to keep both on a Deltran Battery Tender.  I know this is slightly off-topic, but as a second or back-up battery, it seemed to be worth a try.  The only problem with it is that it has the worlds cheapest clamps; they're plastic and I need to get them replaced under warranty (I think three year) or just replace them with some real ones.

David


After some research, I believe this is the model I bought http://www.amazon.com/Vector-VEC1093-Smart-Battery-Charger/dp/B00009RB0T/sr=1-11/qid=1171375702/ref=sr_1_11/002-2593746-1823233?ie=UTF8&s=automotive, although mine came from Walmart.